Book excerpt: Zdenek Kratochvil's publication focuses on the approach of the Western philosophical tradition to physis, or nature. The scholar reveals, on a philosophical level, the roots of today's environmental crisis, calling his text "an attempt to descend to the uncertain and rich lands of nature's experience, to the lands of natural experience." The introduction presents an etymological explanation of the notion of "nature," analyzing its aspects. The scholar points out that neglecting the appreciation of nature results in harm to the world. It is therefore necessary to focus on the world and its plurality - as the background for phenomena and the context of things, as a unity of horizons, as a paradigm for understanding nature. However, the natural world exists not merely as a philosophical problem, but also one concerning real life. Kratochvil also explains the categories related to the perception of the world: matter, space and time. Other chapters deal with living nature (he ask about the identity of a living organism, about the relation of life and being), evolution (he attempts to provide "a description of evolutionary events based on experience, analyzes Darwin and neo-Darwinian evolutionism) and the epistemological issues (of the ability to know the living). He discusses the paradigms of the reality, while focusing on modern paradigms.